Jason Bradford

Really / my skin is sinking, and I will forget / how February was full of snow

Confessions #2

we spindle through air
like dead mammoths hidden
between graveyards,
we laugh
at the fingers shaking on the trees.
We tilt our heads
as if water is
in our ears. Smiles form
like paper birds. A wolf's silhouette
breathes into the sky. Your collarbone
mimics these hills
full of horses
northern lights
strings in a cosmic dress.
Nothing is exactly on point,
which is the point,
exactly. Coins fall
from our palms
as we dance we dance like voices.

Confessions #5

My thyroid is sinking
like a particulate
lofted in the dry, morning sun. Drool is
leaking from my lips,
and there is something
violent in the way
air flows.

The whirl of winter.
The world full of splintered flower stems.

I am so attached to utterances!
I am so attracted to fluttering jaws

like a moth trap. Really
my skin is sinking, and I will forget
how February was full of snow

and disappointment.

Soon leaves will grow

out of the trees.

I will forget how February was full. Coughing
the body's way to expel secrets.

Jason Bradford divides his time between Wilmington, NC, where he is working toward an MFA in Poetry, and Cedar Rapids, IA. His chapbook The Inhabitants was published in 2013 from Final Thursday Press. He co-edits Cant Journal, and curates Digital Roots, an online poetry reading series.